


Another Day to Find You

by Brit Hux-Tico (birchwoods01)



Category: The Last of Us
Genre: Alternate Ending, F/F, Fix-It of Sorts, GAME SPOILERS IF YOU HAVE NOT FINISHED, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-02
Updated: 2020-07-02
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:28:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,758
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25038490
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/birchwoods01/pseuds/Brit%20Hux-Tico
Summary: An alternate ending to the game. Picks up with Ellie standing on the hill overlooking Jackson where the first game, The Last of Us, ended.
Relationships: Dina & Ellie (The Last of Us), Dina/Ellie (The Last of Us)
Comments: 8
Kudos: 141





	Another Day to Find You

**Author's Note:**

> I finished the game a week ago but this story has been a bug in my ear ever since. I loved the game and do not begrudge the relatively sad ending, but for my own heart and happiness, I wanted to write something warmer. 
> 
> The title "Another Day to Find You" comes from the song Ellie sings to Dina: "Take Me On".

Ellie crested the hill, her left hand curling into a fist sans her last two fingers, narrowing her eyes in the glint of the sun. Jackson lay below her, nestled and cradled in the valley like a swaddled baby in mother nature’s arms. It was a place of miracle that it could still stand despite how the world had crumbled around it. She could remember how she was supposed to feel the first time she lay eyes on the place- but instead, she had been uncomfortable, her heart still, guilt and dread gnawing away at her. 

_Swear to me_ … 

_I swear._

Joel had lied to her, so many times. He had lied, and for what? To protect her or to protect himself?

A month ago, before California, standing in the exact spot when she’d confronted her adopted father about the Fireflies, she would have felt unease and raw agony, that open wound left still, even after she had confronted him about what he had done, about his lie. 

Now, all she felt was empty. 

Ellie slowly sank down into the swaying green grass, watching the twinkling lights of Jackson from a distance, her arms propped up on her knees, her thoughts on Abby. 

She’d gotten away. Ellie had let her go. 

It was all for nothing. 

Dina had warned her that she would leave. Dina had warned her that she wouldn’t do this again, be the potential-widow waiting around for the rest of her life while she pondered Ellie’s potential demise, raising JJ on her own. 

Ellie couldn’t blame her. But she had nowhere else to go, after returning to their pretty little farmhouse up on the ridge and finding it vacant. She had to return to Jackson. It was either that, or end up forever alone. 

She could stay with Tommy and Maria. But what would she say to him? To Tommy?

_I had her… I had Abby in my hands, she was under the water, I was almost there and I-..._

“I couldn’t do it,” Ellie whispered out loud, a single tear rolling down her cheek. 

The wind blew a lonesome howl through the trees as night began to fall. Ellie sat still as stone, examining the sleepy little town below, free of infected and full of people trying to live some semblance of a normal and happy life, safe in the arms of the ones that they loved. 

She had that… with Dina. But she’d traded it for vengeance she was too weak to take in the end. 

“Whaddya say, Joel?” Ellie whispered into the falling night, kicking a canvas sneaker into a clod of dirt, cracking her neck back and forth. “Maybe you taught me something, afterall.”

She forced herself to her feet, determined to at least visit Joel’s grave one last time, to stop by Jesse’s parents house, where Dina was surely staying, and just make sure she and the lil’ potato were okay, grab some provisions, bypass Maria and Tommy, then be on her way. 

Her lips turned up in the corner as she pondered potentially finding a Firefly. 

“Back to square one,” she grunted as she pressed on down the hill toward Jackson city. 

At the wall, they let her in without question, the large gate swinging open. Greetings of excitement and surprise were shared, hands clasped, hugs given, and Ellie did her best to slink away from them all, tossing them a salute and word of thanks, slipping quickly, alone into the street. 

Get in, get out, grab gear, be quick. 

No one would miss her.

The graveyard was first. Ellie was not surprised to find that Joel’s grave had been well tended. Fresh flowers had been placed in the vase before his headstone, and the leaves had been raked away from the soil and grass that concealed where his body lay. 

Ellie quietly kneeled over the place, her palm flat on the earth, her breathing even and still. 

“... I’m so sorry,” she whispered brokenly, taking a fistful of grass in her hand. “I’m so sorry, Joel... “

Joel smiled in her memory of him, sat down across from her on the bed, guitar upon his knee, and shook his head. 

_I struggled a long time with survivin’... but you keep findin’ somethin’ to live for._

Her heart heavy under the memory of his words, knowing, in that moment, that he had meant her, Ellie wiped at her damp eyes and running nose, inhaled heavily, then got back up to her feet. 

“Did you find her?” a voice spoke behind her, and Ellie whipped around, hands held out to her sides, ready to grab a weapon, if needed. 

But she was in Jackson; it wasn’t needed. 

And the person speaking was the last person in Jackson she’d wanted to run into. 

“Dina,” Ellie breathed out low. 

Dina did not speak again but stood still as a doe, her wide, brown eyes piercing Ellie knowingly, examining her, and, as usual, seeing straight through her bullshit. Ellie could only stand there and take it, stand there and be subjected to those pretty eyes and the stern scrutiny behind them. 

“Did you find Abby?” Dina repeated, this time slowly, as if Ellie hadn’t heard her before. 

Ellie flexed her left hand, the phantom pain of where Abby had bitten her pinkie and ring finger clean off ringing at the stubby tips that remained. Dina’s gaze was drawn to the motion and her face crumpled in mild disgust and disappointment. 

Silence descended between them. Dina continued to study her former lover. 

After a moment, she shifted on one hip, the dark hair of her ponytail swinging off of her shoulder and behind her back as she took one step closer, a hand on her hip. 

“... was it worth it?” she asked softly. 

Ellie’s head lowered, her eyes glancing up at Dina in mild humiliation. Before she knew it, her eyes were welling with tears, and she raised her right arm, pressing it against her eyes, wiping away the mess with her flannel sleeve. 

Dina moved closer in a heartbeat, her hand pressing just lightly to Ellie’s upper arm, and the gesture somehow worsened her feeling, as the guilt and despair at having left both Dina and her little boy behind consumed her, the relief that Dina at least didn’t hate her enough to treat her like garbage, the _hope_ that maybe Ellie wasn’t quite as lost as she thought she was. 

“Come on,” Dina was whispering, and Ellie allowed herself to be guided away, stumbling slightly as she followed after the woman she loved. 

If she wasn’t feeling so guilty, if she wasn’t feeling so broken, she would have joked at how strong the other woman had become, would have teased her, touched her, held her. 

But she didn’t deserve it. Not anymore. 

Dina led her along by the back road, around the corner, a familiar path they had taken long before the events of Seattle, right after Joel’s death. Ellie barely recognized the porch of Joel’s home in the dark, but as they slipped past the gate and into the backyard, Ellie recognized the separate garage that she had called home since she and Joel had moved into Jackson nearly six years ago. 

Dina had the key now, and Ellie waited silently, tears damp on her cheeks, as Dina unlocked the door and stepped back to let Ellie in. 

“Where’s JJ?” Ellie finally worked up the courage to ask as Dina locked the door then moved into the little kitchenette area. 

“With his grandparents,” Dina responded quietly, fetching a kettle and filling it with water, only to take it over to the wood stove that already had a fire going. In fact, the entire room was warm from the comparable chill outside. 

“You-... you been staying here?” Ellie questioned softly, taking in the rumple of the bedsheets on the bed along the wall. 

Dina sighed as she placed the kettle onto the woodstove, turning around abruptly. 

“Just because we’re done doesn’t mean I wanted to be,” she uttered sharply, her gaze pointedly accusing. “You were the one who left me. Alone to protect a baby in THIS world, might I add.”

Ellie shifted backward, dumping her pack off of her shoulder onto the floor, shaking her head. 

“Well, yeah that was shitty but… you were the one who gave me an ultimatum,” Ellie countered abruptly, sniffling slightly as her emotional status was slowly changing from heartbroken to riled up. “You could have waited for me.”

Dina laughed dryly and shook her head, staring at the wood floor in disbelief. 

“You… you really don’t get it,” she muttered. “Well, I’m glad you didn’t _die_ , Ellie.”

Dina started for the door, undoing the latch, but Ellie made a sound of dismay and followed her, stating “no” as she caught Dina in her arms, both of their hands on the doorknob, skin to skin. Dina stopped, head lowered, trembling slightly at the feel of Ellie’s breath on the back of her neck. 

“Just… just stay a while,” Ellie breathed softly, tilting her lips against her ear, just touching as softly as possible. “Stay here for a… a moment, just a moment, please?”

Dina tensed as Ellie’s arms wrapped tentatively around her waist, but as Ellie’s hold tightened, as Dina’s body was pulled back into the familiar embrace, her hand dropped from the doorknob, and she turned in Ellie’s arms. 

“I’m so… angry with you,” Dina half-sobbed into her shoulder, forming a fist and pounding it against Ellie’s chest, only to turn her face and nuzzle it under her chin, pressing as close as she possibly could. 

“I know, I know,” Ellie whispered over and over, her injured hand covering Dina’s head, rocking her steadily against her, kissing her forehead, lips twitching at the little damp sheen of sweat there. “Will it help if I let you beat me up?”

“Don’t make jokes,” Dina demanded firmly, pushing back just slightly in Ellie’s embrace to glare up at her. “Don’t you dare.”

Ellie studied her eyes, her expression softening with all the guilt and shame and relief to find her okay, and pressed her hand to Dina’s cheek, stroking beneath her eye with her thumb. 

“I’m so… so sorry,” she tried, but her voice broke, and the tears began to build again. 

“You’re such a dummy,” Dina grumbled, but then she pushed forward on her toes and claimed Ellie’s mouth in a greedy kiss, making a soft sigh of desperation at the familiar feel of her lover’s mouth on hers. 

Ellie clutched her close, kissed her back as if she needed Dina as much as air, and the two swayed on the spot, barely standing only by their weight resting against the other. 

Dina broke it first, pulling away and wiping at her mouth in shock, almost as if she regretted forgiving Ellie so soon. As she walked away to remove the now whistling kettle from the wood stove, Ellie figured she hadn’t quite been forgiven yet. It would take time. And lots of sucking up. 

A truce called for now, Ellie sighed and slunk back toward the bed, lowering herself to sit on the edge as she kicked off her canvas shoes. 

“Nuh-uh, you stinky thing. Get up,” Dina ordered her, striding toward her with the kettle of water. “Wash first.”

“Oh, that’s what the water is for,” Ellie’s lips pulled in a crooked smile as she shifted, lifting her flannel up and over her head. “I thought you were making me tea.”

“Maybe later,” Dina offered with a slight smile, directing Ellie toward the tub in the corner. 

Ellie walked toward the tub obediently, beginning to lift her tank top but hesitating as Dina followed her. She turned halfway toward her, her shirt lifted just slightly to expose her stomach, hand caught on the cloth, and stared at Dina with sorrow in her gaze. 

Dina gave her a wry look and rolled her eyes. 

“Ellie, I know it’s gonna be bad. Just do it,” she gestured toward the clothing, and Ellie shrugged and turned, ripping the shirt up and over her head. 

A smattering of yellow and black bruising cascaded down her back, mixed in with a scab or two here or there from some wounds that must have been quite nasty upon receiving. Ellie averted her eyes as Dina added the boiling water to the already tepid water resting in the tub, making the entirety of it at least bearable to bathe in. 

She didn’t deserve it, nor expect it, but Dina helped her bathe, a welcome reprieve for Ellie, who’s entire body still hurt from her journey. It had been weeks since she and Abby had parted ways, weeks since their fight to the death, but some wounds took much more time to heal.

Especially the ones on the inside. 

“Did you… did you kill her?” Dina asked as she drizzled water down Ellie’s bruised back, taking care to avoid the really bad ones as she started to scrub her clean. 

Ellie sat silent, staring at the murky surface of the water, then finally shook her head, just barely. When she spoke, her voice cracked just a little. 

“I-... I couldn’t do it,” she managed to say, staring at her hands beneath the surface of the water. “I-... I had her there… she would have drowned, but the people-... the people who had captured her had tortured her. They’d… cut off all her hair and hung her on a … on a post. She had a kid with her… a boy.”

Dina continued to wash Ellie as she spoke, saying nothing, but being silently supportive just by being there, something that, before all the mess had happened, had helped Ellie along into falling in love with her. 

“He was the boy from the theater and he was hurt, bad…,” Ellie trailed off, the surface of the water rippling at the sudden trembling of her hands. “I saw… I saw J-... him, a memory… first of his face when he… and then-... then his… his smile and I-...”

The wash rag froze in place on Ellie’s shoulder as Dina watched her face, her expression somber. 

“I just-... let Abby go,” Ellie choked on a sob, turning her head and letting the tears drip slowly down her jaw, watching them fall into the water. After a moment, Dina’s fingers rubbed slowly over her scalp, combing gently through her hair, then brought up small scoops of water to dampen it. 

Ellie shifted in the tub, leaning into the side Dina was bent over, and Dina responded in kind, wrapping her arms right around her, kissing her temple. 

“... so…,” Dina muttered after a while, holding Ellie to her chest, kissing the top of her head and thinking a sweet prayer of thanks to God for bringing this woman home to her again. “I guess it _was_ worth it.”

Their evening went much like that fateful evening before their journey to Seattle had gone: Dina held Ellie while she cried herself out, both of them nestled close together in bed, Dina cradling Ellie’s head against her breast, stroking her hair, a present comfort. 

When the tears had dried came the desperation, the hunger, the need to chase away that dark loneliness like a beast in the night, to light up the pathway home with the burning passion of their love. Ellie initiated, following the desperate need to feel one with her again, to feel whole. Their hands and eyes and mouths connected to every part of one another’s bodies, falling into a familiar form of worship that healed their internal wounds. 

Afterward, as Ellie dozed, exhausted beyond all reason but fitful, tossing and turning with the pain of her dreams, Dina held her close, laying with her eyes open in the dark, meeting the stare of the hand of God on the bracelet she had given to Ellie to protect her, long ago. 

This was not perfection. The world around them was still rotting, and Ellie was still healing, and Dina was still forgiving. But humanity was still living, and they were still loving, and Dina felt that this was good enough for her. 

Afterall, second chances were hardly given in a world as cruel and harsh as the one they were living in. Who was she to withhold them?

“I love you, Ellie,” she whispered softly into the feathery hair curled up by Ellie’s temple. The young woman shifted closer, her body warm, and Dina settled down into her arms. 

**Author's Note:**

> If you'd like to follow me on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/ardentlyloveyou) please do! I love to talk about Star Wars, video games, and other various and fun things!


End file.
